KENSINGTON — A police officer involved in a controversial traffic stop of an elected official last year has been placed on paid suspension as a final decision on potential discipline is being made, interim police Chief Kevin Hart announced Thursday night.

But in another twist in the ongoing saga of this hillside town, Hart himself is now the subject of an investigation related to that incident.

Members of the town”s police board agreed Thursday to hire an outside lawyer to probe allegations that Hart had inappropriately revealed details of the internal affairs investigation of officers Juan Ramos and Keith Barrow for their part in a traffic stop outside town limits of police board member Vanessa Cordova. The decision came during a closed session Thursday night, which Cordova did not participate in.

Hart announced at the same meeting that Ramos has been suspended with pay as the probe continues. He told residents that action does not mean the officer will or won”t be disciplined.

Cordova received written notice Friday that the board has authorized an investigation into a complaint she brought against Hart, alleging that he revealed details of the traffic stop investigation at a meeting with residents last month and said she was acting violently when she first went to the police station to make a complaint, which she denies.

“Hart told residents that my version of the traffic stop was not true,” Cordova wrote in a complaint, and that Hart told residents she was “violent” and “throwing things ” when she was at the police station about an hour after she was pulled over by Ramos and Barrow in Berkeley on Oct. 7. People at the meeting have told this newspaper they heard Hart make the comments.

“He was describing her as being hysterical and out of control,” resident Simon Brafman said. Hart”s remarks “were highly inappropriate.”

The interim chief said she threw things, including a phone, Brafman said. “I think he wanted people to think she was hysterical at his office so she couldn”t be believed about what happened earlier.”

In an email Friday, Cordova wrote that Hart”s alleged statements are “not only untrue but so innately harmful that I consider them to be defamatory.”

Both Brafman and another person present at the small gathering at a private home, Andrea Lingenfelter, said Hart claimed Ramos and Barrow had offered an innocent reason why they were in Berkeley, where they pulled Cordova over.

Hart said Barrow asked Ramos to drive him to a convenience store in Berkeley because “Barrow wanted to stop off and get a Red Bull,” Lingenfelter wrote in an email.

It was the theft of Barrow”s gun and badge by a Reno prostitute that set off a political storm here last year that has not ceased. At Thursday”s meeting, resident Lori Trevino said district phone records she obtained under the public records act raise new questions about when board members first knew about the weapon theft.

Trevino said phone records show a series of calls from Barrow to former chief Greg Harman on the day the gun was stolen, and Harman exchanging three calls with Welsh the same day. Welsh has said he had no direct knowledge of the gun theft around the time it occurred and didn”t want to know facts about it in case Barrow appealed any discipline to the board of directors.